1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a system, apparatus, method and computer program for externally configuring an image processing parameter for use in an image input device.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, among image processing applications, such as photo retouching software operating on a PC (personal computer), an application which displays both an original image and its processed image obtained by applying desired image processing for comparison is known.
Using such image processing application for color adjustment of an original image enables a user to tune a color adjustment parameter to obtain a desired result, while comparing the original image and a processed image to which a designated color adjustment has been applied.
Further, in digital cameras, setting of a layout of obtained still images for displaying the images arranged like a photo album has been proposed (Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2005-176216).
In this manner, image processing on image data obtained by image capturing using photo retouching software or the like on a PC and setting a display layout in a digital camera and outputting the laid out images have conventionally been proposed. However, these processings are independently performed on the PC and the camera and the processings do not cooperate with each other.
At this point, when a device to handle a moving picture such as a video camera is used, as the moving picture changes in real time differently from a still image, timing control is difficult in a single device, or there is an excessive processing load. Further, even when a similar image processing operation is applied to an input image, the obtained result may differ when the processing is applied. For example, there often occurs a difference between the result of image adjustment, such as image quality adjustment or color adjustment, by tuning a parameter of a video camera upon image capturing and the result of a similar image adjustment by PC software after image capturing.
Further, even image input devices of the same model may have slightly different characteristics. From these points, it can be considered that image quality adjustment or the like by a collaborative operation among devices easily produces a better result.
The image quality adjustment by a collaborative operation between a PC and a video camera may be performed as follows. First, software on the PC transmits an image processing request signal with a desired configured parameter to the video camera. The video camera performs image processing corresponding to the image processing request on an image obtained by image capturing, and transmits a video image resulted from the image processing to the PC. The software on the PC obtains the video image resulted from the image processing and displays the image on a screen. This operation is repeated a plurality of times while the image processing parameter is changed, and then the software on the PC simultaneously displays the images obtained from the video cameras for comparison. Then, a user selects an image having preferred color tone from the displayed images. Then, the software on the PC sends an image processing request with an image processing parameter configured in correspondence with the selected image to the video camera. Thereafter, image obtained by image capturing have the user's desired color tone.
The image processing by the collaborative operation between a software on the PC and the video camera can be performed in this manner. However, it is necessary to repeat the image processing request and the image capturing and output processing a plurality of times between these devices. The time required from the image processing request issued from the software on the PC to the acquisition of processed image differs according to the performance of the PC or video camera model. From the viewpoint of software processing, it is simple to perform the image processing request and the image display at constant intervals. However, to smoothly perform the collaborative operation in various combinations of PCs and video cameras, it is necessary to set sufficient time intervals, which increases processing time. Further, generally, a decoding processing operation required for displaying compressed video data transmitted from the video camera is a heavy burden imposed on the PC.
Particularly, assuming that the digital video camera and the PC are set in an actual image capturing site and used in a collaborative operation, it is desirable that the PC is a portable type machine. In this case, as the PC is battery-driven, it is desirable to reduce the processing load on the PC to achieve a reduction in electric power consumption.